Upper limb muscle forces: A comparative study

Analysis of upper limb motion is a huge domain. Motion modelling and simulating research need tools to evaluate in vivo muscle forces with non-invasive techniques. A well-known method to estimate muscular forces is the Hill musculotendon actuator type model (Hill 1938; Hoy et al. 1990). A more direct approach, the EMG-to-force processing method (EFP; Bogey et al. 2005; Heintz and Gutierrez-Farewik 2007), allows an easier evaluation. In this context, we propose a comparison between the muscular forces estimated by the two different approach techniques for three distances of a simple reach-to-grasp movement.